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JERUSALEM – Abdul Fatah Abed Rabbo will have his day in court in a month or so.

The charge against him: building without a permit. But the structure in question is not what most people would consider to be – in the strict sense of the term – a building.

Rather, it is a cave, and it has served as Abed Rabbo's home for the past 12 years.

"Don't charge me," says the 48-year-old tree farmer. "Charge nature."

It was nature that fashioned the cave where Abed Rabbo lays his head at night, but it is war – or the legacy of war – that compels him to do so.

If he were a less headstrong sort, Abed Rabbo would have sold the cave and the five hectares of surrounding land a long time ago. Lord knows he's had offers, but he refuses to sell.

"I am the most stubborn one in my family," he says. "I won't sell this land. Not now, not ever."

The land in question, sloping down the flanks of a rocky hill that descends toward the southwestern edge of Jerusalem, has belonged to Abed Rabbo's family since the time of the Ottoman empire, when his ancestors dwelled in a nearby village called Wallajah.

But the times have changed.

Nowadays, Wallajah is merely a memory. From a perch in front of his cave, Abed Rabbo peers down upon a far more contemporary vista, including Jerusalem's train station, its largest indoor shopping mall, its main soccer stadium and its Biblical Zoo – not to mention the security checkpoint staffed by Israeli border police on Yitzhak Modai St.

In fact, Abed Rabbo and his land are in danger of being swallowed by the city, and it was this threat that caused him to continue his residence in the cave. How else can he protect his property?

"This was the only land left for us after the 1948 war," he says, referring to the conflict that produced the state of Israel.

Thousands of Arabs fled the fighting that raged through the Holy Land, including Abed Rabbo's grandparents and parents, who eventually ended up in a refugee camp. Their land, of course, remained behind.

Some years later, Abed Rabbo's mother had the presence of mind to register the property with Israeli authorities.

A dozen years ago, Abed Rabbo came to the conclusion that this was not enough. To preserve ownership, he would have to live on his land and work it.

This he continues to do, tending to hundreds of olive trees as well as a smattering of fruit trees. He also keeps some chickens and rabbits and has a dog named Rex.

In the Desheisheh refugee camp, about 10 kilometres south near Bethlehem, Abed Rabbo has a wife, Widad, and eight children, all of whom seem a bit perplexed that dad lives in a cave.

He is able to make the trek from the West Bank into Israeli territory only because the security wall currently being built by the Israelis has not yet been extended along the hilltop above his land. But Abed Rabbo carries on with his unorthodox existence just the same.

The cramped interior of his abode is furnished with two cots, a wood-burning stove and a miscellany of pots, bowls, tinned food and other items. A small transistor radio dangles from the ceiling on a string.

Over the years, Abed Rabbo has added a rough extension, built of fieldstones and roofed with zinc sheets, that projects from the mouth of the cave. This might be what caught the attention of Israeli housing authorities.

He could be forced to tear it down, but in the meantime, he soldiers on.

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